February 27th, 2009 by admin

When most of us think about a piano, we think of a concert pianist playing a grand piano, but there are two or three types of piano, here we will discuss them, from the grand piano, to the upright piano to the digital keyboard.

Starting with the beast itself -the grand piano. The giant size of the grand piano is what helps it mantain its monsterous sound as it needs longer strings, which reduce lower frequencies and. The smaller grand pianos, such as the baby grand and the boudoir have thickers strings on them to allow for string tension, keeping clarity in the sound. Tension in the strings would be lowered if they used a concert grand’s strings, giving it an unplayable and muddy sound. The sizes of the grand piano range from 2-3 meteres for a concert piano, to 1-2 meteres for a boudoir grand piano to the baby grand piano, which is just slightly smaller than the boudoir.

The ‘upright’ piano is usually what you’ll find in a majority of the homes that have pianos. With its frame and strings horizontally housed inside the piano, the upright piano is slightly smaller than a grand piano, but can still be 45 inches or taller.

The electric piano, often mistaken for another keyboard (sadly) also has the foot pedals which control frequency and pitch that a keyboard doesnt have. Not sounding as good as an acoustic piano, even with digital technology.

And as for those digital keyboards…..

Much smaller, cheaper, easier to carry around than a piano, the keyboard is the closest most of us will come to owning anything like a piano. Digital techonology allows the keyboard to carry hundreds of sounds within its frame, from steel drum sound, to church organ to grand piano, all in one shell.